American Literature - ORA201052
Title: Americká literatura
Guaranteed by: Katedra anglického jazyka a literatury (41-KAJL)
Faculty: Faculty of Education
Actual: from 2013
Semester: winter
E-Credits: 0
Examination process: winter s.:
Hours per week, examination: winter s.:4/4, C [HT]
Capacity: unknown / unknown (unknown)
Min. number of students: unlimited
4EU+: no
Virtual mobility / capacity: no
State of the course: taught
Language: English
Teaching methods: combined
Note: enabled for web enrollment
priority enrollment if the course is part of the study plan
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Annotation -
This course aims to give the students a general outline of the most significant events in American literature, focusing largely, but not exclusively, on canonical authors. Seminars are generally preceded by an audiovisual presentation of a particular literary movement, including its social and cultural background. This is then followed by a close reading session which focuses on the selected seminar texts (short stories, plays, extracts etc.).
Last update: Ženíšek Jakub, Mgr., Ph.D. (13.05.2019)
Course completion requirements -

CREDIT REQUIREMENTS: 90% attendance, one seminar paper based on one of the assigned topics (approx. 1000 words). Oral exam (see Moodle) 

Essay deadline: 3 days prior to the oral exam

Last update: Ženíšek Jakub, Mgr., Ph.D. (28.10.2019)
Literature -

Primary recommended sources:

  1. Ruland, R., Bradbury, M. From Puritanism to Postmodernism, New York: Viking Penguin, 1991. ISBN-13: 978-0140144352.
  2. Procházka, M., Quinn, J., Ulmanová, H., Roraback, E. Lectures on American Literature. Praha, 2002. ISBN 9788024619965.
  3. High, Peter, An Outline of American Literature, London: Longman, 2007.
  4. Van Spanckeren, K. Outline of American Literature – revised edition. US Information Agency, 1994.
  5. Lauter, P., Yarborough, R., Cheung, K., Molesworth, C.  The Heath Anthology of American literature, Early Nineteenth Century: 1800 - 1865, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2005. ISBN-13: 9780618532988.
  6. Lauter, P., Yarborough, R., Alberti, J., Brady, M. The Heath Anthology of American literature: Volume A: the Beginnings to 1900, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2008. ISBN: 0-618-54250-7.

Secondary bibliography:

  1. Bercovitch, S. (ed.). The Cambridge History of American Literature. Cambridge, 1994.
  2. Bradbury, M.:. The Modern American Novel, Oxford: O.U.P, 1992.
  3. Elliott, E. et al, (Eds.) Columbia Literary History of the United States, Columbia University Press, 1988-2001.
  4. Hendin, J. (ed.). A Concise Companion to Postwar American Culture and Literature. Londýn, 2004.
  5. Minter, D. A Cultural History of the American Novel,Cambridge:CambridgeUniversity Press, 1996.
  6. Procházka, Martin a Stříbrný, Zdeněk. Slovník spisovatelů [literatur v angličtině]. Nakladatelství Libri: Praha, 2003.
  7. Roth, J., (Ed) American Diversity, American Identity,New York: Henry Holt, 1995.
  8. Starling, M. W. The Slave Narrative: Its Place in American History. Washington, DC: Howard University Press, 1988.
Last update: Ženíšek Jakub, Mgr., Ph.D. (28.10.2019)
Syllabus -

1. Lecture: Colonial US literature (online video – home assignment)

Intro / Lecture 2: Enlightenment and revolutionary period

Reading assignment – Benjamin Franklin: 2 pamphlets

 

2. Lecture: Romantism

Reading assignment – Washington Irving: The Legend of the Sleepy Hollow

Reading assignment – E.A.Poe: The Black Cat, The Tell-Tale Heart

Reading assignment – N. Hawthorne: Birthmark, Rapaccini’s Daughter (optional)

 

3.  Video Lecture: ideological overtones of Romanticism – slave narratives

Reading assignment – The Narrative of Frederick Douglass

Reading assignment 2 (optional) – H. D. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience

 

4.  Lecture: Realism/Naturalism I (local color)

Reading assignment –Kate Chopin: A Respectable Woman and 4 other stories

Reading assignment –A. Bierce: An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

      S. Crane: The Red Badge of Courage (synopsis + excerpt)

 

5.  Lecture: 18th through 20th century poetry  (+online video)

Reading assignment – Whitman, Dickinson, Frost, Hughes, Pound

 

6. Lecture: Modernism I

Reading assignment: William Faulkner, Barn Burning; A Rose for Emily

Reading assignment: Ernest Hemingway, A Clean Well-Lighted Place, Hills Like White Elephants

 

7. Lecture: Modernism II (Jazz Age)

Reading assignment: F.S. Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

 

8. Lecture: American drama I

Reading assignment: TennesseeWilliams, Streetcar Named Desire

 

9. Lecture: American drama II (Theatre of the Absurd)

Reading assignment: Edward Albee, The Zoo Story

 

10. Lecture: Jewish-American authors

Reading assignment: Phillip Roth, Defender of the Faith

Reading assignment: Bernard Malamud, Armistice

 

11. Lecture: African American literature

Reading assignment: Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye

 

12. Overview and synthesis

 

Last update: Ženíšek Jakub, Mgr., Ph.D. (28.10.2019)